Formed by members of Desolate Shrine and Dark Buddha Rising, Finnish funeral/death-doom duo Convocation return with their immense sophomore LP Ashes Coalesce, a monumental sonic devourment where slow-moving atmospheric death metal and void-sculpting extreme doom collide to signal the onset of oblivion and resound one of the most lightless and soul-consuming expressions of sonic abandon the genre has seen in the latter part of this decade. Like a massive maelstrom slowly circling a lightless void, the colossal album assumes form through a slow-moving morass of telluric drums, crushing guitars and bass, and guttural spectral vocals emanating from beyond a veil, that suck all light out of their surroundings and slowly encircle the listener immersing them into a suffocating abyss of levitating agony and inescapable hopelessness. Within the churning mass of oppressive distortion and hallucinogenic soundscapes lies a connective tissue of strings, synths, organs, and orchestrations that thread the listener's demise as the suffocating atmospheres condense and crawl to a climax, assuming a sense of inescapability and multidimensionality that ultimately surround and crush the listener into forty minutes of awe-inducing sonic immensity that deceive thee senses and defy logic.
